DEFENDING HUMAN rights can be a perilous task. It has cost Abdulla Alderazi his job as a professor in the University of Bahrain and threatened his personal safety.

Last month he received a letter of dismissal from the university informing him of their decision, “for reasons of my activity”, he said.

In Dublin this week for a conference held by Frontline, an international organisation that supports defenders of human rights across the world, Prof Alderazi expressed an unshakeable desire to continue his work as secretary general of the Bahrain Human Rights Society.

A host of authoritarian regimes will be entertained in London today at one of the world’s largest arms fairs, despite concerns over how readily unpopular dictatorships turned to live ammunition to suppress popular revolutions during this year’s Arab Spring: here.